d all come right. And it has."

Inwardly I thought it had done anything but that, but under the
circumstances my confounded conceit was considerably tickled by her
approval, and I felt disposed to purr. However I answered that talking
over natives was an everyday affair with me, in fact part of my trade,
and by the time we sat down to lunch--which was not long, for the
morning was well on by then--good humour seemed generally restored.
Even Falkner had got over his sulks.

"I say, Sewin," I said to him as I passed him the bottle. "You were
talking about going on a trading trip with me. It wouldn't do to get
chipping bits out of the chiefs' head-rings on the other side of the
river, you know. They take that sort of thing much more seriously over
there."

"Oh hang it, Glanton, let a fellow alone, can't you," he answered,
grinning rather foolishly.

"By the way, Major, has anything more been heard about Hensley?" I
said.

"Hensley? Who's he? Ah, I remember. He's been over at our place a
couple of times. Why? Is he ill?"

"Nobody knows--or where he is. He has disappeared."

"Disappeared?"

"Yes. Nobody seems to have the slightest clue as to what has become of
him. He went to bed as usual, and in the morning--well, he wasn't
there. He couldn't have gone away anywhere, for his horses were all on
the place, and his boys say they had never heard him express any
intention of leaving home."

"Good gracious, no. We hadn't heard of it," said Mrs Sewin. "But--
when was it?"

"About a fortnight ago. I didn't hear of it till the other day--and
then through native sources."

"Oh, some nigger yarn I suppose," said Falkner in his superior manner,
which always ruffled me.

"Would you be surprised to hear that I obtain a good deal of
astonishingly accurate information through the same source, Sewin?" I
answered. "In fact there is more than one person to whom it relates,
who would be more than a little uncomfortable did they guess how much I
knew about them."

"Oh, then you run a nigger gossip shop as well as a nigger trading
shop," he retorted, nastily.

"But what a very unpleasant thing," hastily struck in his aunt, anxious
to cover his rudeness. "Does that sort of thing happen here often?"

"I never heard of a case before."

"Probably the niggers murdered him and stowed him away somewhere,"
pronounced the irrepressible Falkner.

"Even `niggers' don't do that sort of thing without a motive, and